Reply to Dec 18th: FY 2026 Recommended Operating Budget

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]There's also been a shortage of forwignnlanguage teachers for over a decade.  Those who teach done know the languages they are teaching - a total disaster.    As are physics, stem, special ed, etc.  The entire field of teaching, and can you blame teachers?  Horrible pay, entitled parents, kids with horroble behaviors and absolutely no consequences.

Who here would wish their child to become a teacher?  Noone[/quote]

"Forwignnlanguages" is another area that doesn't have the same legal or educational importance as special education. That shouldn't be a priority until we get other subjects in better shape.[/quote]

I agree that first MCPS needs to meet legal requirements for SPED.  MCPS spends money now on defending lawsuits about SPED rather than just actually meeting legal requirements.  If to meet legal requirements SPED teachers or paras need a pay bump or other change to working conditions to ensure staffing requirements are met then that must be done.  Not doing this is costing MCPS money and putting them at risk of high payouts when sued.

It is also true that MCPS has trouble attracting high level STEM teachers but since MCPS is already using Montgomery college to meet this need it does not seem as much a priority as making sure MCPS is not sued and can stop spending money defending against lawsuits from SPED families.  Yes, I think MCPS should offer these classes at each high school but they do have a back up plan.  The problem here is STEM professions often pay much better for the skill set that high level stem teachers possess.  I do not think MCPS can compete on pay for these professionals.  But they can compete on working conditions so should focus there.

And yes Foreign Language teachers are also in short supply, especially good teachers, but I would rather see money spent to lower class sizes across the board and create better working conditions for all teachers hoping then to attract and retain better teachers.

Of teachers and Paras SPED does require a different skill set and also requires the ability to manage difficult behaviors including behaviors that could cause physical injury.  It makes sense to pay differently for SPED.  It also makes sense to make sure there are enough SPED paras so that regular classroom teachers do not need to manage SPED students as well as their whole class. [/quote]

Pp here.

For what it's worth, I don't think we're really competing with particularly high-paying private sector jobs for STEM teachers. Private sector STEM jobs are very different than STEM teaching jobs. Very different skills. Very different environments. And different classes in college in most cases.

I think you need to look at it in terms of encouraging more people interested in teaching to persue the STEM path from the beginning. A relatively small differential could help there.

Obviously that wouldn't address the overall teacher shortage. But I think there's only way one to do that: improve conditions by reducing workloads. That should improve the quality of education, too.

But it will obviously come at a cost. My fear is that the further we go down our current path of maintaining expensive benefits and doing moderate across-the-board pay increases, the harder (read: more expensive) it will be to make the broader structural changes that are will be necessary long-term.[/quote]

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